The Independent

Chef found guilty of murdering former partner in 2012

A pub chef has been convicted of murdering his ex-partner after blaming her for their child being taken into care, the Crown Prosecution Service said.

Darren Osment, 41, killed Claire Holland, 32, in a drunken argument hours after she was last seen leaving a pub in the centre of Bristol in June 2012.

Despite extensive police investigations, the mother of four has never been seen since and her body never found.

Bristol Crown Court heard that when Osment fell under suspicion detectives deployed an undercover officer to befriend him who then recorded his repeated confessions to her murder.

Between December 2020 and July 2022, the officer – posing as a man called Paddy O’Hara

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